There have been a lot of weird endings to football games over the years, but what happened at the end of the Wisconsin-Platteville Division III NCAA game against Wisconsin-La Crosse Saturday is up there. The UW-Platteville Pioneers were hosting the 11th-ranked UW-La Crosse Eagles, and they were set for the upset down 24-23, driving to the Eagles’ 15 with less than 10 seconds left. But they didn’t have a timeout, so they had to snap the ball and get their QB to spike so they could send on the kicking team for a 32-yard field goal attempt. No problem, right?
Kneeling instead of spiking, what a nightmare.
pic.twitter.com/5QLOs5H6qR— Billcotterforcongress.com (@Billyhottakes) October 16, 2021
Nope, that’s a problem. Kneeling means that the clock runs, which is why you see that from winning teams at the end of games. And the Pioneers eventually realized this and tried to line up and spike the ball again, but didn’t do it in time. That’s quite the unforced error. Here’s more on what
Of course, maybe UW-Platteville misses the field goal even if the spike is performed correctly. Their kicker had missed an extra point earlier in the day, part of what led to this situation. But it’s quite something that they never got the chance to try the field goal. And that’s yet more incentive for teams to practice what you do in a late-game situation with no timeouts.
[Uproxx, The La Crosse Tribune, BillyHotTakes on Twitter]
